They met while attending Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, and married in 1969. Originally from Detroit and Moline, Illinois, the couple moved to PEI in 1970 after Gerald landed a one year teaching job in Kensington.

They were teaching in Quebec's Cégep system when they first visited Prince Edward Island in 1972. The following year they purchased land on the Wigmore Road, and in the summer of 1975 they moved there full-time.

He was teaching philosophy at the University of Vermont when he and his wife visited PEI during his Christmas vacation in 1972. Enchanted by the Island's beauty, the couple moved to the community of Milo the following year.

Rousseau was a member of the University of New Brunswick football team when he first visited Prince Edward Island in 1967. Six years later the Dorval, Quebec native moved to Hopefield with two college friends.

Steve grew tired of being an airlines employee in Toronto and moved to the Island in 1971. He worked a variety of jobs over the next decade, including operating a health food store in Montague, before starting a home-based bakery on the Lewes.

Marion taught high school in North York, Ontario. In 1978 she opted to relocate to the Island. While taking courses on woodlot and chainsaw maintenance she met Tony Reddin, an Islander, who offered to help her with the project.

Pinsent and his family began their back-to-the-land experience in a British Columbia commune before eventually settling in South Granville, PEI, where they lived off the grid and maintained a large organic market garden.